Abstract: There are abundant studies on the relationship between family socioeconomic status， and individual mental health， yet few have explored the topic of whether the impact of education on mental health is heterogeneous among groups of different socio-economic origins. Resource Compensation Theory and Resource Enhancement Theory present a pair of competing hypotheses： when self-induced educational achievements and pre-existing family social status work together， there might be either compensatory effects or a tendency of mutual enhancement to affect mental health. To examine the applicability of these two theoretical hypotheses in China， this study utilizes the 2017 data of the Chinese General Social Survey（CGSS）， taking personal educational level as the core explanatory variable and the social status of family origin as the moderate variable. The study investigates whether the promoting effects of education on mental health vary across different family backgrounds and whether there are gender differences in the moderating effect of social status of family origin. The results of the study indicate that both the social status of family origin and the educational level play significant roles in improving mental health status. Moreover， there is a significant moderating effect of social status of family of origin on the relationship between education and mental health both in the overall population and gender-specific groups， which supports the Resource Compensation Theory. In other words， individuals from disadvantaged social status of family origin can obtain more mental health benefits from education compared to those from higher social strata. Furthermore， compared to males， females facing dual disadvantages obtain much higher mental health returns from educational achievements. This paper provides evidence-based implications for enhancing the mental health of females and individuals with disadvantaged family capital.

Key words: education, social status of family of origin, mental health, Resource Compensation Theory, Resource Enhancement Theory